Confessions of an Airport Grouch

I’ve never been a huge fan of travelling. I can’t take people seriously when they talk about going away to ‘find themselves’ – I tend to want to point to them and go “Look, look, you’re right here! You don’t need to spend thousands of euros trekking across the desert or jungle, after all!”

A very large part of it is that travelling itself – actually moving from one place to another – does not agree with me. Boats make me seasick, while airports just depress me. This recent story about a six-year-old girl in the States being selected for an ‘enhanced pat-down’ while going through security dismays me, but honestly, fails to surprise me.

I’ve been on four short flights in the last month or so, to and from the UK. On the plus side, unlike travelling to the US, you don’t have to fill out wacky forms stating that you’ve never been involved with the Nazi Party. On the down side, there’s still the tedium of security to go through.

You can’t complain. No. You can’t complain, because then it looks like you’ve something to hide. I complained in a painfully polite way on one flight, when my contact lens solution was over the 100ml limit. Much in the same way as I wouldn’t bring the doctor’s original prescription with me if I had necessary medication – why on earth would you feel you needed to? – I didn’t have a letter from my optician stating the solution was necessary. I don’t stick things into my eyes on a near-daily basis for the fun of it, after all. But EU regulations are tricky little things – and, somewhat conveniently for those that work in airports, completely out of their hands. You can’t complain.

They’re small moments, but they accumulate. On another flight, a friend of mine had bottles of cosmetics tested. I asked whether they’d been under the limit. “Oh yes, of course they were,” she said calmly. “I think they were just doing a random check.” And then, seeing me getting cross and irritated by it, suggested we go for a cup of tea.

I freely admit that I’m not the most fun person to travel with when airports are involved. I do get annoyed. I do get bothered. I do get grumpy if I ask security folk what’s set off an alarm that necessitates my being patted down and they reply with a sentence that includes the word ‘random’. I do find the fact that you have a choice between the delay and expense of checking in a bag or having strangers scrutinise your hand luggage completely repulsive.

But I’m not apologetic about it. It should annoy us. It should seem invasive and intrusive – as many things in modern life are, of course, but there’s something particularly bothersome about airport security. It’s the way we accept it, grumbling quietly if at all, because we fear not being allowed to travel. Being labelled as disruptive or dangerous. Being troublesome. And we fear, perhaps, what might happen if the regulations weren’t there.

Only… I don’t feel safer travelling on a plane simply because a potential terrorist will have a limited amount of liquid. I don’t feel safer travelling on a plane because I’ve had a stranger (usually unattractive, alas) run their hands over me to ensure I don’t have a concealed weapon. I’m sure some people do. I’m sure that some of those who are nervous flyers find it vaguely reassuring to think that there are some measures in place to prevent certain kinds of disaster. I’m sure those who adore finding new places and, indeed, finding themselves, feel a bit of intrusion at one stage of their journey is nothing compared to the joys that follow. I’m sure that many people just get used to the strange dystopian universe that is airport security.

But I can’t. So I’ll continue to be grumpy, and complain. I’m honestly not sure what I can do about it, and I don’t travel enough to make it a mission of mine to pen endless letters or campaign or whatever might make some kind of a difference. (I suspect the answer involves getting the airlines on board, and lots of time that I don’t have.) I’ll just stay a decidedly un-fun person to be in an airport with. I still haven’t found a good enough reason not to be.

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It is not, I think, a matter of reason Claire. A colleague of mine had to do a great deal of air travel. One day when he was supposed to be on a plane to New York he came into my office around noon. He apologised. He said that he was sitting in the departure lounge when the flight was called but couldn’t move. Nothing in the world could induce him to get up and make the flight. He couldn’t do it any more . He apologised. I sent him home. We had to accept that he couldn’t be expected to fly again.

I can imagine after a while it does just get to you. I think a lot of people find air travel relatively stress-free because they’re heading off on holidays and all will be well from then on; if it’s for work it’s a different story.

I completely agree with the sentiments here. Heathrow Airport is an Orwellian nightmare. My husband and I recently came back from a holiday in Argentina during which we took seven flights, those there and back, and internal flights in Argentina. On the way back we were making our connecting flight to Dublin Airport through Heathrow. I travel a lot between Ireland and the UK, so I know the deal in Heathrow. But it was pleasant, I have to say, just getting your bags scanned through in Argentina – none of the stripping down, liquids in silly bags, etc. that we are used to over here.
Anyway, it was about six in the morning and we hadn’t really slept on the flight from Buenos Aires. We obediently followed all the ‘Flight Connection’ signs beyond the main arrivals area until we reached what looked like another, mini passport control. Not being used to a lot of long-haul travel, we thought that this was just one of the procedures that is involved in flight connections. We hesitated and a woman came out to us and, without asking what we were doing or where we were going, checked our passports and sent us through. Then we realised that we had exited the arrivals area. When we told the woman the situation she told us that she couldn’t do anything for us. We were scanned through now and would have to go through normal departures.
Walking though the customs area, my husband was stopped by the guy there, who promptly started searching his bag. Checks are ‘random’, I suppose. But I also suppose the demographic of the person they are looking for is young, male, leather jacket, unshaven, looks like he hasn’t slept, white powder clinging to nostrils (no, scrap the last bit). Everything was taken out of the bag and checked. The lining of the bag was checked, described as ‘feeling funny’ and we were told that the bag may need to be ripped apart. But, no. Perhaps it would be okay to just put it through a scanner.
After that ordeal, we headed for departures. And so began the sorting of liquids, taking off of shoes and belts, etc. We had to peg out a bottle of wine we’d bought in Argentina that we thought, after explaining the situation to the good people at departures, we could have brought through to the connecting flight.
So, I fully understand your sentiments. Of course, we know there are reasons for these procedures. And we are trained to ignore the dehumanising aspects of airports most of the time. But sometimes it’s just too hard! I got on that plane to Dublin and I was fuming. My husband had to practically restrain me back at departures when the wine had to go. He is of the opinion that if you as much as complain or shoot these people a look, they can make things very difficult for you. They can stop you flying and getting to fabulous places likes Buenos Aires.
So, single file, everyone. Eyes on the floor. You don’t want to be noticed, do you, by the big beady eye? You don’t want to be noticed and dragged off to Room 101.

Lack of clear signposting, particularly when the consequences for leaving certain areas are often time- and energy-consuming, is so frustrating. Am used to seeing those ‘please note you are leaving this area…’ type signs but for connecting flights things do seem to get messy in some places.

>> He is of the opinion that if you as much as complain or shoot these people a look, they can make things very difficult for you. << Yes. Which is a reasonable opinion. Even delaying people a little can create difficulties.

Bag searches are just so intrusive. It really is amazing how protective we get over our property in any situation other than the airport…

At last, someone (actually, several people) who feels the way I do about air travel! When I tell folk that I hate to fly, they assume I’m afraid, when in fact I’ve never been nervous on a flight in my life. I just hate airports and air planes and air travel! I hate the waiting, the recycled air, the ridiculous security checks, the pointlessness of the whole thing. And, as an extra treat, I get really motion sick when I fly, so I can either take anti-nausea pills that leave me feeling groggy for the rest of the day, or not take them and feel my stomach rise and fall with every tiny movement of the plane. I used to suffer from those nasty air pressure pains in the ears too, but I buy the funky ear plugs now, which has solved that problem (is it a placebo effect? I don’t know and I don’t care!)
I’ve had a little experience of internal travel in South America too. In Brazil a few years ago my internal flight made three stops. At each one people got off, crew did a quick tidy up, people got on, we were all offered some nice toffees and we took off again (total time per stop: about 20 minutes). And now we have the Ryanair fortycoats shuffle, as we all try to fit everything we’ve ever owned into a carrier bags and coat pockets (ears? mouths? armpits?) so we don’t have to pay them for the privilege of taking us home (oh wait, we already have paid them…). Even writing about it I’m feeling my hackles rise… Harrumph!

Oh gosh, recycled air, yes indeed. Think it was QI that had a bit about non-smoking on planes actually leading to the air being replenished less frequently… (surely it is true if Stephen Fry says so!)😉

Being offered nice toffees, or nice anything, makes all the difference sometimes.

The most creative alternative to strictly policed airports I ever heard came from an “anarcho-capitalist” (anarchist who wants to see a stateless capitalist world) who argued that passengers should be free to carry guns on planes. He said that so long as they exchanged their regular ammunition for ammo that couldn’t pierce the shell of the aeroplane then it would be fine. Dozens of gun-wielding civilians on planes would, he argued, remove the terrorism threat as they’d immediately shoot anyone trying to hijack the thing! Hehe, it sounds nuts but full points for imagination anyway!

I absolutely loathe airports, but I kind of think that’s the way it should be. I don’t think anyone has the right to travel by air, or that it should be made easier, because it’s so appallingly destructive environmentally. So I’m fairly happy to see air travel made more and more difficult by security concerns so that the alternatives become more popular and desirable.

>> So I’m fairly happy to see air travel made more and more difficult by security concerns so that the alternatives become more popular and desirable. <<

I'd be far happier to see environmental concerns being tackled via… you know, them actually being tackled. I mean, it's a beneficial side-effect if you're looking at it like that, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I love flying. I love flying more than any other kind of travel. The moment as the plane’s speed picks up and the rush of air under the wing increases the pressure so that the whole mass of metal suddenly leaps into the air – it’s absolutely fantastic. I love looking down at the fields below. Once when I was flying to Seattle over the Arctic I got to see two sunsets in a single day and got to look down on the pole ice and see cracks big enough to sail a ship into.

I hate airports.

I used to just hate them a tiny little bit (Heathrow was always vile) but in the years since September 11, they’ve only got worse. I stopped flying to the US early in 2004, though it had been the country I most frequently visited before that: when I went to Canada in 2009, I took care that neither outward nor homeward flight would involve me even passing through the US. Heathrow was bad enough. (My luggage got searched because I had a bottle of water: the man next to me was having his carry-on searched because he’d packed a carton of coffee-mate.)

Unfortunately the return flight entailed passing through Heathrow for what I really hope to be the last time – just as I thought I was home (right down to the confiscation of the inflight wine which I’d dropped into my bag at about 3am UK time) I had to line up to be photographed because I was transiting between one terminal and another.

Edinburgh Airport wasn’t so bad the last time I used it, but I’ve consistently tried to avoid flying since – true, trains are expensive, ridiculously more expensive than flying, but far less intrusive.

I do not feel safer because complete strangers claim the right to search my luggage. I do not feel safer because morons will not allow me to carry a pair of metal nailclippers aboard the plane, and make me dump onboard wine and water from Boots because it’s outside the 200 ml limit. I feel that I am in the hands of morons who were trained by Kafka and have the manners of weasels.

Oh, those kind of flights sound amazing. Have generally had a more positive experience on longer flights actually – it’s the short ones, where you’re spending more time in the airport than on the plane, that get you.

>> I feel that I am in the hands of morons who were trained by Kafka and have the manners of weasels. <<

I find the liquids rule and mad scanning even more ridiculous as in the many years (and probably 30 or 40 flights) since she was diagnosed as diabetic, my sister has been asked only once for any sort of evidence that she was carrying needles and vials of toxic chemicals on her person for a reason. Considering that a single pen could knock out the entire crew, it makes confiscating my 120ml toothpaste seem a little pointless..

I just read this in Dan Gardner’s “Risk: The Science and Politics of Fear”:

“Roger Congleton, an economist at George Mason University, has calculated that an extra half-hour delay at American airports costs the economy $15 billion a year.”

The point is that counter-terrorism restrictions that hinder international trade and travel will harm the economy. Since the risk of dying from a terrorism attack is very low, and the risk of a poor person dying of a disease associated with poverty is much higher, the net result of these counter-terrorism restrictions could be INCREASED risks, not decreased. Interesting perspective.